ewsieg

It was performative to drop them off in front of Harris' residence. It was a natural flow or migration to get them to another state. Migrants have families all throughout the United States, not just the border states. Many migrants want to get to Michigan, New York, DC, etc. If it was a member of my family, I would have wanted them bussed to Michigan, not DC though, so you got me there. Help us understand the reasoning here. Is the problem that Biden has caused human suffering by letting people be exposed to freezing temperatures? In that case, how is the solution to move people to another freezing jurisdiction and dump them on the sidewalk? Yes, this country is being swamped by would-be immigrants, and a mature polity would address the problem with sensible reforms. But that’s not what the governors of Florida and Texas are demanding. They and their right-wing media claque are saying that immigrants are clamoring for admission to the United States only because President Biden has an “open borders” policy. Here’s a typical story from Fox News: “Biden’s dangerous open border policies are record-breaking in all the wrong ways. Illegal immigrants, possible terrorists and deadly drugs mark Biden’s open border policies.” GOP politicians proclaim almost daily that Biden has created an “open border.” They repeat this mantra even though it flatly contradicts another of their favorite talking points, namely that the border patrol has experienced record numbers of encounters with would-be crossers. The CPB reports that agents had 2.2 million encounters with illegal border crossers in fiscal year 2022—a new record. (Many are repeat crossers.) If the border were truly open, the border patrol would not be apprehending anyone, right? They’d be standing aside and waving them on in. In fact, the constant GOP refrain about the border being “open” may actually be aggravating the problem by disseminating the impression around the globe that it’s worth making the attempt to get into the United States. Here is the complicated reality. It is not Biden’s fault that so many people want to come to the United States. There was a big jump in border encounters under the Trump administration as well (from 310,531 in fiscal year 2017 to 859,501 in fiscal year 2019—the numbers plunged temporarily during the COVID-19 pandemic). People want to come here because 1) so many nations around the globe are hellish and a number of those are within walking distance; 2) this is a place where people with a good work ethic can get ahead and enjoy the blessings of liberty; 3) our immigration laws and rules are confusing. Those who object that immigrants are “breaking into our country” as a burglar breaks into a home are dead wrong. The vast majority of would-be entrants are not sneaking past sentries in the desert or wading through the Rio Grande (not that such acts are equivalent to burglary either). Most immigrants are attempting to come through international points of entry and ask for asylum. This is permitted under a law Congress passed in 1980, providing that people may seek asylum when they have a well-founded fear of persecution in their home country on the grounds of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion. The law was designed for people like the Uighurs in China, the Yazidis in Iraq and Syria, democrats in Cuba, the Rohingya in Myanmar, the Baha’i in Iran, and others. Among those who have benefited from asylum in the United States are Gloria Estefan, Sergey Brin, Hannah Arendt, Salvador Dalí, and Mikhail Barishnikov. The United States separately admits refugees from wars and natural disasters. Here’s another solution to the immigration problem—welcome more legal immigrants! Opponents of immigration frequently object that policy should be aimed at what’s best for this country, not what’s in the interests of millions of unhappy people around the globe. Things are tough out there, sure, but we can’t be the dumping ground for the world’s problems! True, but more immigration is in our national interest. Even aside from the injection of vitality that immigrants always provide, we are suffering from a serious labor shortage. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell estimates that “The combination of a plunge in net immigration and a surge in deaths during the pandemic probably accounts for about one and a half million missing workers.” And the lack of those employees is driving up wages, which is contributing to our inflation problem. The unemployment rate stands at 3.7 percent, a 50-year low. For every job seeker, there are 1.7 job openings. The worker shortages are particularly acute in construction, farming, health care, and hospitality. The owner of a home health care company, Mariama Lowe, told the Washington Post that before the immigration restrictions and the pandemic she employed 100 nurses and personal care aides, most of them immigrants. Now, she is down to 27. She isn’t sure how long she can hold out. The wait for green cards, even for those who’ve been fully vetted, can be insanely long because our needlessly complicated law imposes caps by country of origin. Immigrants from India and China, for example, can wait their entire working lives. We are starved for workers. Americans are paying more for food, housing, and other commodities and services due to the severe labor shortage. We have backlogs of already-vetted immigrants, asylum-seekers with credible claims, and refugees who would gratefully (dare I say tearfully) accept jobs and lives in this country if we could only get out of our own way. I like Mona, but I sometimes I feel like her never Trump views have impacted her ability to reasonably view issues with anyone that is even suspected of supporting anything regarding Trump. She's right to say Abbott and DeSantis (who really isn't dealing with the full impact that land border states are and should just focus on Florida) aren't offering much of a solution either. But it's semantics to say it's not an open policy. We know that the vast majority of these folks will claim asylum and they will eventually lose their case, but already be lost inside our nation. Border agents don't let them walk through, correct. But border agents do work as Uber drivers, collecting them and transporting back to a facility. There a court date is set for them based on where they say they are heading, LA, Washington, Michigan, NY, DC, etc. Then it's up to them to figure out a way to get there. And yes, we are starved for workers. But seriously, that's an excuse? We need more unskilled labor so big corporate American can get back to being opened 24x7 and make ridiculous profits they aren't taxed much on anyway... that's what the party of 'workers' is advocating?

Great discussion. We have a migration issue into this country, specifically at the southern border. It is putting a heavy strain on those communities. The right chants 'build the wall' which would have no impact on the migration issue itself as folks only need to touch American land to claim asylum and the wall is nearly always already inside American land. So it's not like I'm saying the GOP has answers either. But the asylum process is broke on the southern border, it's being incorrectly used on top of that, and we have no ability to process the influx we're seeing. Look at Ukrainian refugees, they were displaced across the country, even some to Michigan and Illinois. Can you believe that cruelty from the Biden administration that he'd send folks already dealing with a war in their own country to states that experienced negative wind chills already this winter? Biden's cruelty is unreal, huh? Migrants were moving north prior, at least for Texas they feel it's more cost effective to assist in finding a destination for some and paying that cost rather than paying the cost to house them as they run out of room. As for the drop off at Harris' again, there was no cruelty there. They would have had to brave those same weather conditions if they had to switch busses at a bus stop. But yes, absolutely performative and used by each side to feed their tightly held beliefs about the other side. I'm not saying this is the right or only solution, but maybe forcing them to claim asylum in their own country or the next closest country (common practice in every instance outside of the southern border) and complete the process before getting here would save so many from threats of that long travel, rather that be sexual assaults' (Doctors without Borders puts that at 31% of girls and 10% of boys), or even death. But nope, when pressed on if it's an issue, go with the 'I like immigrants' response, allowing you to paint everyone that wants to focus on the issue as cruel evil tyrant and continue to believe you're righteous.

I'm not trying to say Abbott is a good guy and was the first to admit this was performative politics. But the migrant issue is real. You are choosing to pick a side and labeling him as the ultimate symbol for cruelty. Yet El Paso can't handle the influx and Abbott has overflowed his major cities with migrants already. El Paso couldn't house some of the migrants over this last cold spell when it went below freezing temps on the border. But somehow it's much better for them to spend the night in 30 degree temps outside than spend a few minutes transferring a bus in 14 degree temps? C'mon, stop feeding into the hate and start demanding some action from both sides who all share a responsibility.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/25/us/politics/migrants-kamala-harris-christmas-eve.html https://www.texastribune.org/2022/12/25/greg-abbott-migrant-busing-dc-christmas-eve/ https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/3788126-democrats-outraged-over-christmas-eve-migrant-drop-off-at-vps-house/ Several days notice, enough to ensure the press was there to get photos as they were moved to local busses.

Of course this is performative politics, but 'standing outside briefly'.... that means folks responsible for moving these individuals to some housing were aware and waiting for them. No different then when they get bussed up from the border in Texas to other cities in Texas. Millions a year are coming in, those border towns can't handle them all. At some point, instead of just playing politics on both sides, it would be nice if someone actually tried to address the issue.

I was waiting for someone to jump to one of the extremist. BTW, Jones is still banned under Musk. Dr. Jay Bhattacharya was one of those mentioned in the Twitter files and he was shadow banned because he warned that the lockdowns would cause great harm on children and their education. I mean, that's right up there with Nazi's and Alex Jones though, so I guess I'm just proving myself wrong.

We now know what most people assumed was true, that Twitter shadow banned people and topics (ideas). Specific accounts were noted in the Twitter Files. Banning outright wasn't the previous regimes M.O.. They worried about the Streisand effect whereas Musk doesn't care and has outright shut them down. I simply contend both are bad.

This comment makes me feel like you've read and studied the left's talking points. Hunter Biden's penis certainly was tabloid fodder, but the reason why the left wants to keep the story tied to his dick is because they don't want anyone to question the emails. Anyway, why would you care about this story anyway? Didn't 50 intelligence officers state this was Russian disinformation? Again, it wasn't specific people that were banned by the previous Twitter regime, it was entire ideas. Rather you think one is worse than the other, I simply contend both are bad.

And note, I'm not defending Musk here. He is proving to be the "Trump of twitter" in my eyes. To explain further, when Trump won, despite not supporting him, I figured 'well, he's right they are all crooks, maybe we can see something positive out of this'. I initially hoped the same with Musk. Initially, just like with Trump, I thought some of the criticism was too much, but this latest thing...apparently regarding @elonjet, has gone to far. Mark Cuban had some legitimate complaints that called out Musk and fell in line with my thinking regarding this debacle. But my overall point is, certain thoughts, even if folks that didn't get banned over them, their tweets were essentially banned, without any public acknowledgement. I personally feel that is an issue, just as these full out bans of some of these journalists are issues as well.

Safe to assume with this response you've completely bought into the idea that Taibbi and Weiss are right wing fanatics and therefore you should ignore everything they say. Also safe to assume you think the lab leak theory is equivalent to a conspiracy theory?

Very true, which is why if you're extremely upset about it now, I hope you were extremely upset about it before, just as if you don't think it's a big deal now, you shouldn't have thought it was a big deal before.

Truth 😉 Extremely legitimate point.

Listened to one of the guys behind this site on the Bulwark podcast the other day. I found it interesting. https://www.historyperceptiongap.us/

Are you saying there is no information on Ukraine or are you referring to the two factor auth issue they had with Ukraine last week for a few hours?

I sent a few screen shots of some of the cards from his video to my wife and asked her to photoshop out the words so I could have them for free. She has yet to respond to me.

Did someone make this with Adobe 'Cellomophone player to make fun of Trump?

The press secretary using the Hatch act to state she can't give the Biden administrations thoughts on returning stolen money. That's priceless.

I wish my wife didn't get the vaccine, or I should say the booster. She's one of very few documented cases where she still has issues (about a year now). That said, she had many doctors state her issues weren't as rare as we thought, simply the odd thing with her was how long it has persisted. I still would have gotten it, along with my kids. I always understood it didn't mean I'd never get Covid, but i'd be better protected and likely have less severe symptoms and duration. Maybe I'm wrong at some level, but it just seems like common sense that by itself would decrease infections as a whole. I know there have been follow up studies, which honestly might be outdated for our current variants, that showed the same amount of virulence for people with Covid with or without the vaccine. But if i'm coughing/sneezing/wheezing less than I would have otherwise, I'm limiting it's ability to get airborne.

Dave Whelan was on Flashpoint (Sunday morning Detroit show) this morning. He was everything you'd hope an American that understands how difficult of a position it is for the detainee, as well as their family, that is held in a foreign country would act. One thing I took out of the interview, and I'm not sure if he said this based on his view that his brother did nothing wrong or if he had some inside knowledge (guessing probably not) was that he said he doesn't believe Greiner even had anything on her. Thought it was an interesting tidbit.

Probably should have said stereotyping. My point is, if you're sympathetic to a cause, you will be more open to listening and understanding what someone does that is on your 'team'. I'm not terribly sympathetic to democratic causes, so I think I did the same when I read this statement from you. Based on how my stereotypical view of most of you on this site, I read that as the only people that get offended are the idiots that think it's the military that gives us our freedoms. I can assure you, many people that are offended by those that sit, kneel, or refuse to come out for the National Anthem don't believe this. Personally I am offended by those that sit or refuse to come out, not kneel in part because even though I don't agree with Kaepernick, I appreciated the back story on why he began to kneel vs sit and I feel a lot of folks that follow Kaepernick understand that as well. So if they choose to sit or refuse to come out, to me that is a direct slap in the face of the military (as it was a military issue for Kaepernick which adjusted how he protested.) At the same time, it is their right to do it, so I try not to hold it against them which unfortunately so many others do.

I feel like you're projecting a bit. Odd, I see that here. I said years ago that at this point, outside of Candice Miller in a local role here in my district, i'm going to be a straight dem voter. I voted straight dem this last time around. I've exalted like most of you how horrible Trump is, but man, mention that Trump shouldn't be blamed for one thing, or say I don't agree with what a dem has done, obviously I love fascism.

I think it's all about how one views the national anthem and it's purpose. Following is my stereotype opinion. As a whole, when it comes to "America" GOP voters are more optimistic (Best country in the world, 'Murica!!! Whoo!!!) and Dem voters are more pessimistic of the country. Maybe not the best way to lay it out as I'm not saying that as a dig against the Dem's, they just look at more of the issues with the country whereas the GOP tends to look for the good. Truthfully it's a bit of both, we are a great country, but with many flaws too. In terms of Colin and Britney, it was perceived as a slap in the face to our military even if they tried to explain that it's a form of protest and not tied to that. I personally don't think they are on the same level, but I'd almost equate it to the nword use. Similar how most people just know not to ever say or write the N-word, you still occasionally see that story of some newly famous person that quoted a rap lyric when they were 15. It doesn't matter what the intent was, that kid will be labeled a racist. Ironically the right will complain about that and argue you should look at the intent. Unfortunately neither side ever gives the other the benefit of the doubt.

I was interested in Biden's 'illegitimate reasons' comment for Whelan. If a terrorist / international arms dealer that was wanted by Interpol isn't enough for Whelan (even if they truly think he was a spy) and a girl with a vape pen (i'm not mentioning by name not to slight her, but to point out how small time her discretion was) , I somewhat suspect that he's off the table in terms of negotiations.

Agreed that there are more questions than answers but IMO, it doesn't really matter if MAGA is a bottom up movement or years of top down engineering, in the end, money is the key to where this goes and that's why I think Trump and the GOP are done. (Doesn't mean he can't steamroll his way to the candidate again, it's just the GOP knows they will lose if he is nominated.) Both parties still rely on big donors first and foremost. Small donors have been focused on by both parties in recent years, but still, you need to keep the big donors happy. You don't have any sign of trouble in the Democratic camp related to either right now. On the GOP side, you have big donors that are clearly done, or at least publicly questioning the direction of the party. As you mentioned with one that could make a huge difference. Add in they have some small donor issues that the dems don't have to worry about, and it's a perfect storm. 1) Losing big donors in general will force the civil war that I think even democrats have hoped for within the GOP. 2) Losing Murdoch hurts from a big donor standpoint, but even worse, he owns media that is sympathetic to conservative ideas. The closest thing comparable to this on the left would be losing Soros and even than, while he supports some media outlets, he's not the owner of them. 3) Trump recognized the sizable chunk of small donation donors and started campaigns to ensure that money goes to him, not the GOP. So while not the biggest chunk, even that is getting attacked by Trump.